1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the art of storing gas including methane as a main component thereof, and relates also to a gaseous fuel automobile having a gas tank for storing e.g. natural gas as a fuel tank thereof.
2. Description of the Related Art
For storing gas including methane as the main component thereof, the convention has proposed use of mainly activated carbon as an adsorbent therefor.
However, activated carbon provides only limited gas adsorbing capacity relative to its volume. For increasing this gas adsorbing capacity per volume, it has also been proposed to mold the activated carbon into an solid adsorbent agent. Yet, the degree of improvement achieved by this method too is rather limited. On the other hand, activated carbon (large specific area acviated carbon) having a relatively large surface area, hence, a greater gas adsorbent capacity per volume, is now available in the market. But, such improved activated carbons are expensive.
Further, with respect to the adsorption and desorption of gas, the activated carbon, due to significant variation in its pore diameter, comes to provide increasingly unstable adsorption/desorption performance with repetition of the gas adsorption and desorption. That is, the activated carbon has the problem of unsatisfactory repeatability.
In view of the above-described state of the art, a primary object of the invention is to propose improved art which allows inexpensive and greater volume gas adsorption and storage capacity and which also allows the gas adsorption performance with better repeatability. A further object is to provide a gaseous fuel automobile using this art.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a novel organometallic complex suitable as a gas adsorbing-retaining agent for a gas such as methane for use in e.g. a gas storage apparatus and a gaseous fuel automobile.